Category: PR Tips

For Christmas I got a SLR camera, and I love it.  Not only did I get a job at the PR Office on campus because of it, I’ve also had to use it for my PR2 class.

Recently, Paver Smith posted at PR Tip of the Day about photography, so I decided that would be a great tip to share, seeing I have learned so much in just the few months I’ve had the camera.

Paver Smith states, “a good photo is a great way of anchoring a page” and this is because photographs are a great way to catch someone’s attention.  Your news release may be a great story, but if you don’t have a great photo to go along with it, it might be overlooked.  Editors try to have great publications, so they want “good publicity photos or graphics.”  Having high quality photos will increase the chance that you’ll get coverage.

It’s also good to know what kind of pictures the publications you’re targeting use.  Make the subject matter match the publication and add a bit of a twist to make it more interesting.  This will all help you get your photo and news release published.

For more information and other PR Tips check out Paver Smith online or download their iPhone App.

It’s important that you know your client.  Understanding the client is key.  Having open communication between the PR agent and the client is a major part of communication.  But knowing the client isn’t the only person the PR people need to know.  They also need to know their audience.

In the news this past week Hacienda Mexican Restaurant posted billboards in Indiana that attempted to be humorous with a cult, mass-death reference. (Picture can be seen below.) Within two weeks of billboards being posted they were removed due to excessive complaints. Apparently, Hacienda didn’t know their audience.

“The use of such a sad event, the mass suicide of a cult, probably was inappropriate in Hacienda’s advertising campaign. Although the reference was used in a clever and humorous way, the billboard still crossed a line because it offended Hacienda’s potential customers. A billboard advertisement, controversial or not, should appeal to the population it’s trying to reach.”

So if you’re planning on advertising for a client, make sure you know the audience they want to appeal to.

To read the whole article visit Yahoo!

According to Paver Smith, “the success of a PR campaign hinges on the ability of the agency to take an effective brief from the client.”  The brief is possibly the most important thing to convey information from a client to an agency.  Everything should flow from the brief.

So what are the key things to ask for a brief?  The things you’re going to want to ask are:

• Where are they now? – Things like the client background, services, current market position, business opportunities or threats, etc.
• Where do they want to be? – Find out who the target audience is, what are the growth areas of the business, key messages, etc.
• What are the client objectives? – Things like what they want you to do, and the timeline to accomplish it in.
• What do they want to achieve from PR? – This would basically be the results.  You must understand what success looks like to the client and the results must be measurable.

*See Paver Smith’s website, http://www.paversmith.co.uk/ for more information or other PR Tips.

Blogging Tip – How to ensure people keep reading.

Blogs are meant for conversation.  It should provoke a discussion between the blogger and the reader.

Before you start to blog, you need to know your audience and choose the writing style that appeals to the target audience.

Once you’ve got a target audience, you need to keep the conversation going between you and them by inviting input.  They should comment on the posts, ask questions, or provoke a discussion. This input will help create a direction for the blog and will assist in keeping the information relevant to the audience.

Avoid the temptation to post long, wordy posts.  Keep the content easy to read.

Finally, let your personality come through.  Treat the blog as if it were a normal conversation.  Showing your personality will help build rapport with you readers, which will make them continue to log on.

*This post was inspired by Paver Smith: Managing Reputations and their PR Tips.  Download their free iPhone app from iTunes for more tips!